


These Hands Painted Red

by didsomeonesayventus



Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, I'm still FE trash tho, Other, idk how to do tags
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-11
Updated: 2016-09-11
Packaged: 2018-08-14 09:57:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8009035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/didsomeonesayventus/pseuds/didsomeonesayventus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“ War is cruelty, and none can make it gentle. ” -Gilbert Parker</p>
            </blockquote>





	These Hands Painted Red

Shigure was one of many who was born during this lengthy end to the war who refused to leave his parents to the gaping maw of the unknown and unspeakable. Though he knew he wasn’t that old (what had been years to him were mere months to his parents) and that he still had much to learn, he would not abandon mother and father, even if they couldn’t explain to him the sanity in jumping into a canyon known for being bottomless.

Valla, was the answer. A kingdom unheard of, unspeakable by punishment of cruel, fantastical death, one that made mother’s voice crack and her eyes grow yet more weary and sad. After finding their first hovel of sanctuary in this strange world, she took him and Dwyer aside to explain to them what the rest of the army need not know. What her mother had told her, their lineage, how even if they could hold a claim to the Vallite throne none wanted them here. Valla was their heritage, but deadly.

“Anankos will likely leave your father alone, since he is merely Nohrian,” Azura said softly, “but that is only compared to us. No one is safe here, and our backs are merely the biggest target.”

The words gave Shigure pause, as if even his intuitive heart could not find the words to express his guilt. Dwyer had merely huffed- which to the untrained ear sounded like a long, bleary sigh as if he’d just gotten up after begging for five more minutes.

“What’s this Anankos dragon guy got against us anyways?” He’d said. “We’re both not even fully Vall-whatever, and I really don’t wanna go down in history as a rotten king who could make a mean cup of coffee.”

Shigure still said nothing. His voice had fallen still.

...

He’d always loved drawing his mother and imagining her in the heat of battle, light radiating off of her, hair a stream of light and water, clothes pristine and voice resonating through bones. Foes would be struck down at her feet, soft voice firmly reassuring in perfect composure “You will not harm those I love” (sometimes, he imagined, sometimes, she named him). The lighting, the composition, all these daydreams of what it would be like to fight by her side, to be useful, more than just the younger son who could only devote himself to the arts.

This was never what he had pictured.

Her clothes stained, ripped, exposing healing scars and fresh blood. Hair a mess, stringy, everywhere, as if it could never decide where to rest on her form. Occasionally it was grabbed by someone, and Shigure would almost steer himself from the fight to scream and get them away from her only to witness the butt of her naginata shove the offender away.

It was noisy.

It was putrid.

It was painful.

It was chaotic.

It was nothing he could ever begin to imagine before now. His last fight- when he had crashed upon their ship looking for aid for those who were perhaps never meant to survive -had ended too quickly for it to sink in for him. Ryoma (dear uncle, proud and tall and mighty) had drawn Raijinto, lightning had struck, and foes retreated from only the mere threat of the legend, the one man army within the ranks. Now Shigure felt the whirl of his polearm slicing through one foe before his pegasus dragged him upon the next. He expected others to finish the job. Now it all passed him in the blurs of his pastels.

Mother screamed. Son reacted, lunged, screamed himself in blinding rage for who dared to hurt her, who dared to lay a finger- A candle was snuffed out by a pegasus wing. A gasp, wet and finite, met his ears the way an out of tune instrument or hoarse, shrieking voice would offend them.

It was quiet now.

As if sensing the horror shaking the grip of its reins, of the polearm and the lifeless excrement of war, the pegasus whinnied and threw Shigure from it. He tumbled to the ground with barely a cry, and the corpse parted itself from the deathly grip upon what had impaled it.

It was so quiet.

Blood dripped from blade to shaft to collect on pale fingers like a bright red rosary. It turned pure white to dirty scarlet (Scarlet, he never knew much of her, only heard she was valiant to the end) and sky blue an ugly, bruising mauve. He felt like he couldn’t move his legs, couldn’t tear his eyes from the sight.

End. Fin. Gone. Lifeless and bloody and ugly. The red was too loud, the corpse was splayed in an impossible, sickening angle. Where was the art in it? Where was the glory of war? He felt dirty, his hands painted red, his heart marred, his soul crumpled into paper.

“My son!” Father cried. Jakob rushed to Shigure’s side, “Gods! You scared the daylights out of me when we found your pegasus and- Are you hurt? Do you need me to-”

“Shigure!” Mother sighed. Azura fell to her knees and wrapped her arms around him, abandoning arms for the tight embrace of peace, “Oh, you’re alright...”

Shigure trembled.

“I know about ten different ways to bandage a wound right now-” Jakob began prattling- worried, deathly worried, but prattling -before Azura backed away and watched her son. She looked at the fallen foe, then the wide, golden eyes staring at it.

“Your first...” She whispered.

“Mother...” He finally spoke, voice cracking.

“Is he ill?” Jakob asked.

“Not physically.” Azura murmured.

Shigure suddenly felt the ground shift, his gaze shook, everything shook, he couldn’t breathe. “M-mother I just- you- him- I-I-I-I- couldn’t- can’t- p-p-please I just-”

“Shigure,” she said, soft, stern, “breathe.”

“M-m-m-m-m- mother-”

“ _Breathe_.” She insisted. She pried the polearm from his grip, took stuttering hands in her own, counting, “In, 2, 3, 4, and out, 2, 3, 4...” He followed the exercise, remembering the singing lessons on a bright, beautiful meadow under a cloudless sky in better softer days. “In and out and in and out, 2, 3, 4... in, 2, 3, 4...” He could only breathe.

“Azura,” Jakob hissed, impatient from the depths of the crease in his brow, “Azura is our son-”

“Glad you care so much about me, dad.” A slow, languid trot brought Dwyer back to his family, “And yeah, as a guy who’s carried more rods and staves than you ever will,” he scoffed a little, “Shigure’s as alright as he’ll be.”

Dwyer slid off the horse, and shuffled over to sit down next to Shigure. Jakob hesitantly sat down next to Azura. Shigure shook, tears sprung from his eyes. His hands were so red. He hated red, it was such an ugly, loud color-

“Shigure, do you want to sing?” Azura asked, “We can make it a requiem.” For the fiend who did not deserve it.

Dwyer shrugged, “I dunno, mother-”

Azura slowly counted them off, “1, 2, 3... You are the ocean’s grey waves....”

Shigure joined in the next verse, “Destined to seek, life beyond, the shore, just out of reach...”

All normally turned their heads to their voices, too lovely to compare to anything natural. Mother and son with the throats of the sweetest angels. Today they turned their heads in shock at the grating, sobbing, broken voice of the son. Tormented, horrified, lamenting. All watched the duet- Kana transforming from their draconian form not at the behest of his mother but at the song, Caeldori standing in silent vigil, Corrin and Subaki forgetting their themselves in fear of their own children feeling such pain, the younger sisters weeping, younger brothers losing their hardened, indifferent shells, the elder siblings shaking their heads at what a spiteful and cruel world this was.

...

After the song was over, after all had decided moving on was necessary, Shigure found himself alone with Dwyer. The two rode beside each other, not quite in the back but plenty private. Respectful space between the two and the rest, but not unguarded.

“... You know,” Dwyer yawned, “I don’t think that was all it was cracked up to be, either.”

Shigure remained silent.

Dwyer shrugged, “It’s hard to get an impression of what you’ve never seen or experienced.”

Shigure murmured, “Why was it so...?” He couldn’t find the words.

“I dunno, brother.” Dwyer said with another listless sigh, “and I don’t think anyone knows.”

Shigure looked down. His hands grew tighter upon reins and polearm. They were clean but so red, so vibrantly, disgustingly red.

“I heard it gets easier.” Dwyer suggested, “I think if you just remember... it’s you or them-”

“What if no one?” Shigure asked, “What if we remember all life is...” He teared up.

“Awesome thought,” Dwyer replied, “but I dunno how well it holds up outside the Deeprealms.”

Not much. He could still hear the screaming. It never held up in the first place, did it?

“Shigure.” Dwyer reached over, gently holding his brother’s hand, “I think it’s gonna be okay.”

Shigure looked up. Dwyer’s bagged eyes smiled. “We have mom and dad, and you got me, too, right? And... and we got everyone else, y’know.”

Shigure stopped frowning. It wasn’t picture perfect, but it was something.

“Maybe... maybe it will be alright.”

**Author's Note:**

> I was playing Revelations and one of my first fights with Shigure had him deal the ending blow and like. I'm not ok.


End file.
